STENY HOYER: (rotunda noise) The Republicans are holding hostage the credit of the United States of America.

DEBBIE “BLABBERMOUTH” SCHULTZ: …our Republican colleagues to hold our economy hostage.

DINGY HARRY: The Republican Party is holding our economy hostage.

CHUCK-U SCHUMER: (rotunda noise) It didn’t say, “Hold America hostage.”

LOUISE SLAUGHTER: …hold the debt ceiling hostage.

SHELDON WHITEHOUSE: One party is holding the country hostage.

JOHN OLVER: The debt limit has never before been held hostage.

BARBARA LEE: Republicans are holding our economy hostage.

EARL BLUMENAUER: …willing to take hostage the debt ceiling.

JASON ALTMIRE: Stop holding America’s credit rating hostage.

ROSA DeLAURO: The Republican majority continues to hold the American economy hostage.

CHRIS VAN HOLLEN: Let’s not hold the entire American economy hostage.

JOHN LARSON: …ideological hostage situation…

LLOYD DOGGETT: The only belt they’re really tightening is right around the neck of those hostages.

JAMES CLYBURN: Holding the American economy hostage.

JESSE JACKSON, JR.: This president is being treated differently!

SPEAKER PRO-TEM: (gavel banging)

JACKSON: No other president has been stuck up, shook down, or held hostage!

• NBC News’ Sharpton Airs Lame Segment Calling Tea Party ‘Monster’ that ‘Will Destroy You’

• Dem Rep to GOP: ‘Stop Fragging the American People’

• Pelosi: Boehner Turned to ‘Dark Side’

• Charles Krauthammer Scolds Margaret Carlson for Saying Tea Party ‘Strapped Explosives to the Capitol’

• MSNBC ‘Morning Joe’ Panelists (Yet Again) Call Tea Partiers ‘Economic Terrorists’

• Van Jones : GOP Putting a “Gun to the Head of 310 Million People”

• Bob Schieffer’s Social Security Fear Mongering on CBS

• CNN Incorrectly Hypes Seniors’ Fears of Social Security Default

• Pelosi: ‘We’re Trying to Save World From GOP Budget, Trying to Save Life On This Planet as We Know It”

• HuffPo’s Frank Schaeffer Compares U.S. Evangelicals to Taliban, MSNBC’s Bashir Fails to Object

• Pelosi: GOP Using The Budget Deficit to ‘Destroy’ and ‘Undermine’ Government

• Hoyer: GOP “Want to Shoot Every Bullet they Have at the President”

• Pelosi: Republicans Want to Destroy Your Rights

• MSNBC’s Martin Bashir Slams ‘Right-Wing Nutters’ as ‘Biggest Threat’ to Global Financial System

• GOP “Ideological Terrorists” Threaten Default: Sally Kohn on The Ed Show

(In regards to the above cartoon ~ The Blaze):

The cartoon, drawn by Arizona Daily Star artist David Fitzsimmons for his August 1 “Cartoon of the Day,” shows the U.S. Capitol looking more like Beirut in the 1980′s- pockmarked with bullets, buildings in near collapse, even the Washington monument snapped in half. The Flags of Hitler’s Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan fly high above the U.S. Capitol.

As inflammatory as this talking point may be, it is also based on a false premise. As Ken Shepherd of News Busters points out, the proposed balanced budget amendment:

“would require the President to submit and Congress to enact a balanced budget, cap federal spending at 18% of GDP, and prevent future federal tax increases. Congress could only waive these provisions by a two-thirds vote, except in times of declared war or by three-fifths majority during times of military conflict. It would also require a three-fifths majority to raise the federal debt limit.”

Facts are indeed stubborn things. Congress promptly declared war on Germany and Japan in 1941. And perhaps with a balanced budget amendment in place, Congress would reassert its Constitutional authority to declare war going forward.